3.3 Painting on Copper: an Overlooked Production
Miel’s versatility is further confirmed by his ability to move from one technique to another. In this regard, I would highlight his production of small devotional paintings on copper.1 This type of artistic production was widespread in Rome, not only because the works appealed to private collectors but also because of their status as precious objects of devotion. Once again Miel tested himself, achieving a brilliant result by blending the details of everyday life, so typical of Northern painting, with elements influenced by key examples of 17th-century Roman visual culture. This is the case with The Martyrdom of St Agatha [16] (private collection), a painting inspired by the powerful composition of Nicolas Poussin (1594–1665) for the celebrated altarpiece The Martyrdom of St Erasmus, but on a smaller and more personal scale. The gravity of the martyrdom is softened by the narrative elements of the painting, which are particularly evident in the foreground where two dogs are about to fight and a man blows on the fire to stoke the flames that heat the pincers. Here Miel employed the bright colours of Poussin – something he would explore further in the 1650s, particularly in the church of Santa Maria dell’Anima.
The sources on Miel, including his biographers, fail to mention his works on copper. As I have argued elsewhere, this is why several autograph works suffer from wrong attributions. For example, The Martyrdom of St Laurence [17] was sold as by an ‘Anonymous 18th-century French painter’, but it can clearly be compared in style and chronology to The Martyrdom of St Agatha.2 Recently an unpublished version of The Martyrdom of St Laurence [18] was brought to my attention.3 The two versions are nearly the same size (30 x 38 cm and 29 x 38.5 cm), and just a few minor differences can be seen between the two: the bloodstain on St Lawrence’s ribs, the size of the curtains at the left, the building in the background, and the position of the pink flag and spear. In my opinion, both these works were realized in the 1640s. To these two paintings can be added a third version of The Martyrdom of St Laurence [19] in a private collection, and a St Roch in the Museo di Casa Martelli, Florence.4 These paintings, all on copper, are the happy result of the combination of the Northern taste for meticulous detail with the language of Roman painting. Furthermore, they show that Miel produced a series of small devotional paintings on copper alongside his genre paintings.
16
Jan Miel
The Martyrdom of Saint Agatha, dated 1649
Paris, New York City, art dealer Haboldt & Co.
17
Jan Miel
Martyrdom of Saint Laurence, 1640s
18
Jan Miel
Martyrdom of Saint Laurence, 1640s
Paris, New York City, art dealer Haboldt & Co.
19
Jan Miel
Martyrdom of Saint Laurence, c. 1650-1655
Private collection
Notes
1 I dealt with this subject more widely in a recent article: Gaja 2020.
2 Gaja 2020, p. 120.
3 I would like to thank Hélène Sécherre and the Haboldt Gallery for sending me a picture of the painting and for allowing me to publish it.
4 According to Kren The Martyrdom of St Lawrence was formerly in a private collection in New York; its present location is unknown: Kren 1978, vol. 2, p. 138 cat. A109. A picture of the painting can be seen in the Fototeca Zeri in Bologna (box 581, folder 581, card 61974): http://catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it/scheda/opera/64413 (as ‘Anonymous Roman painter, 18th century’). On the St Roch: Civai 1990, p. 78, 101 note 68. These two works may have been realized a little later, around the first half of the 1650s.